-Our first guest tonight is an Emmy-nominated actor
you know from his work in "Oz," "Wet Hot American Summer"
and his Detective Elliot Stabler
in "Law & Order: Organized Crime."
New episodes air Thursday nights at 10:00 right here on NBC.
Let's take a look. [ Cheers ]
-You met with Octavio earlier today?
-I did.
All those failed investigations, thing of the past.
We got Octavio. We're gonna get Murphy.
-No, we're not. -No, Octavio's gonna give me
a statement that places Murphy as the shooter.
-Octavio is dead.
[ Ominous music plays ]
-What? -They couldn't get ahold of you.
The warden called me.
♪♪
Octavio was murdered tonight.
They found his body outside the showers.
-Please welcome back to the show,
Christopher Meloni, everybody!
[ Cheers and applause ]
♪♪
Welcome back to the show!
[ Cheers and applause ]
-Thank you!
-You pulled something off that I think all dads would aspire to.
It was your wife's birthday, correct?
-Yes. -And you went out clubbing
with your wife and... -Yeah.
-...your children came. Your children were willing
to come to the club with their parents.
-My daughter was the instigator.
-It was her idea? -Yes. Yeah.
-Wow. -She's got her finger
on the pulse, and I pretend that I have the same finger.
-I mean, she has to then have an expectation
that you're not gonna kill her with embarrassment at the club.
-Yes, that's true. -Yeah.
Did you behave well, do you think?
[ Laughter ] I mean, this is --
There's some photographing of it.
-There's a lot --
[ Laughter ] -I mean, I will say --
-Now, do you know what that is from, though?
-What's that? -So, my daughter and I,
because it was in the middle of the pandemic,
we couldn't celebrate my 60th and her 20th.
-Okay. Got it. -So they're very close together,
our birthdays -- she's March 23rd, I'm April 2nd.
So we did 21/61. -Oh, very nice.
-Yeah. I did an Evel Knievel look.
-I will say, if you didn't know your dad was gonna be
at the club, and you saw this, it would be a nightmare.
-Let's see. -I would say that
would not be... [ Laughter ]
-Okay. -If you all of a sudden
were like, if someone came over, was like,
"I think your dad's here," it would be pretty devastating.
[ Laughter ]
[ Cheers and applause ]
So -- -I always get this.
"Your dad looks really angry," and all I have to do
is pull one of these. [ Laughter ]
"Come on in! We got pancakes. Relax."
-That's true. I imagine, based on which
part of your work people have seen,
they might think you're angry all the time.
But again, you have a whole comedy side that
people could be familiar with that, too.
-Yeah, and I kind of straddled that with
"Wet Hot American Summer," little crazy, little angry...
-I feel like if the kids have seen that,
they kind of know you're in on the joke.
That's a helpful thing. -There you go.
-This is third season of "Organized Crime," but obviously
there's a character you've been with forever.
It must be nice to play someone like Elliot Stabler that you,
at this point, must know better than any role
you could ever hope to take on. -Yeah.
You know, it's one of these things that
you know him better than anybody.
You know, it's -- yeah. So, you try and, uh -- yeah.
[ Laughter ]
I really do know him. [ Laughter ]
-You -- one of the cool things about it is --
Oh, by the way, I forgot to show this.
This is after the club? -No, that's pre-clubbing.
[ Laughter ] -Pre-club?
-Yeah. -Pre-clubbing.
-Yeah, that's how -- I entered the club like that.
[ Laughter ]
-And do you know how I was greeted
by the woman at the door?
Like this. She went...
-Oh, wow.
-And I went like this.
[ Laughter ]
-And I entered, and I partied, and I danced.
-Yeah. [ Cheers and applause ]
-I'm assuming -- -Thank you.
Probably -- They probably didn't card you, I'm gonna guess.
-No, no. -Yeah.
-Made me angry, but I let it pass.
[ Laughter ]
-This is so -- you shoot on the streets of New York.
You've obviously worked with so many actors over the years.
I mean, that's one of the great things about
the "Law & Order" franchise -- one, you shoot on the streets.
Two, you shoot with every great New York actor.
Over the years, almost everybody.
And this is the great Ann Dowd. And you've, uh --
When was the first time you guys crossed paths?
-She did an episode of "SVU." -Back in the day?
-Back, back, way back, like 20 years ago.
And I was embarrassed that I didn't know who she was.
Because when you act with Ann Dowd,
you are just blown back 20 feet because she's such a powerful,
creative actor.
And so any way, I was like, "Oh, my God.
Who the hell is this? I've just discovered you,"
and she's very famous. [ Laughter ]
-Yeah. -So, anyway, I worked with her
on "Handmaid's Tale." -Yep, you were great in that.
Both of you. -And she's --
I don't know her name, 'cause I watched it,
but it was a thousand years ago on that one.
But her character on "Handmaid's Tale"...
-Lydia. Aunt Lydia. -...is so evil.
-Yeah, she's a bad -- -And she couldn't be,
as a person, obviously, more lovely.
But anyway, I bumped into her on the street.
And we have this big love fest.
And we're catching up
because we don't get to see each other too much.
And this woman comes up to us.
She goes, "Oh, my God. I love you so much."
And I turned around, and I said "Thank you."
She goes, "Not you." [ Laughter ]
"Her." And I laughed at myself.
I was like, "Me, too! Me, too!
I love her more than me, too!" [ Laughter ]
-That's why I never stand with another famous person in public.
I can't take that risk.
-That's why you always run away from me.
-Yeah, when I see you on the street, I'm like,
"I don't want to risk it!" [ Laughter ]
"A lot of Meloni fans out on these streets."
[ Cheers and applause ]
Now, I know -- I feel like these are "Law & Order" fans,
but I was a fan of your early commercial work.
[ Laughter ]
So, you did -- This is your early days.
-Yeah. This is -- This is what got me out of
the bars, and not from drinking but from being a bouncer
and a bartender and all that. -Gotcha.
-You did both a Burger King and a McDonald's, correct?
-Oh, man, I did like 50 commercials.
-Gotcha. And those were --
I mean, again, all jokes aside, that was real money
to do a commercial, and the more it played,
the better off you do. -Residuals.
-Yeah. -Sure. I mean --
I would go to my -- You know, guys from New York,
you know, you have those little mailboxes like that,
and you'd stick that key in.
If there's a dull thud, you know it's stuffed.
[ Laughter ]
And I didn't have a lot of bills because I had -- I had no TV.
I had nothing.
And it would go thud, and I'd open it, and --
pbt! -- springing out would be all these residual checks.
-And sometimes they -- you actually can't believe
for the work of the envelope and the stamp
how little those residual -- -36 cents.
[ Laughter ] -It all adds up.
-Or $2,500. -Well, there you go.
-It's like a lottery. It's like rolling the dice.
You open up the envelope, "What's it gonna be?"
-I want to show a clip from, I think, Burger King is first.
Let's take a look at this. -I don't even remember this.
-Oh, this is very good. Let's take a look.
-Yumbo, the hot ham and cheese sandwich now at Burger King,
and, one day, in your dictionary.
-Yum.
-I mean... [ Cheers and applause ]
-Great [bleep] -Yeah.
[ Laughter ]
-That's -- That's talent, number one.
But number two, and this is -- Take this story home with you.
It'll be great to tell people over dinner or something.
The behind-the-scenes is, I go, and I get the job,
and the producer looks at my hands and he goes,
"Your nails and your cuticles, like, with this face."
He goes, "Get a manicure." I go, "Okay."
They called a manicure place,
opened up early 'cause we were shooting at 8:00 a.m.
They had a manicure place open at 7:00 a.m.
There are not too many manicure places open at 7:00.
I'd never had a manicure. They do my nails,
and the lady says, "Do you want polish?"
And, you know, we're New York.
I'd never had a manicure. And you see a lot of them guys,
you know, with the shiny -- -Yeah, they look nice.
-You know, they look nice. -Tough guys, nice fingers.
-Your nails look nice. So I got a polish.
And the producer hit the roof.
[ Laughter ]
He went nuts on me. He was yelling at me.
There you go. -So that's --
And, again, not a lot of people --
People forget about the burger wars,
but in this era, it was very -- you had to be quite an actor
to go from a Burger King commercial
to a McDonald's commercial. -Oh, yeah.
-Very few could do both. -No. Thank you.
-I know we are talking about comedy and drama,
but to do a Burger King and then a McDonald's...
-Yes, truly. -And the McDonald's one,
I want to show it twice. But the first ti--
I want to show it first and hear what your memory of it was.
Let's take a look. -Therefore, if you want to
go out with me, we will not be going to any restaurant
which refers to itself as a bistro, a casa, a maison.
We will be going to McDonald's.
[ Laughter ]
-There you are, on a date, insisting to a woman
that you will only be going to McDonald's.
[ Laughter ]
-Laying down the law. -Yeah.
-Yeah. Women like strong men.
-Yeah. [ Laughter ]
I was gonna say that, if you watch it, it also feels
like one of those Lifetime movies where a woman is,
for the first time realizing, like,
"Oh, this guy's a full lunatic."
[ Laughter ]
-Mike Lindell's first date. -Yeah.
[ Laughter ]
-It was all pillow-based.
[ Cheers and applause ]
Man, oh, man, what a pleasure to have you here.
Congratulations again on season 3.
[ Cheers and applause ]
Christopher Meloni! "Law & Order: Organized Crime"
airs Thursday nights at 10:00 here on NBC.
We'll be right back with D'Arcy Carden.